Steampunk fantasy novel, first of a series, involving a heroine with a bulletproof corset who works for a secret London organization pursuing villains intent on enslaving all Britons.
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Series site The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences has a description with quotes from reviews, a blog, a video trailer, and a guide to steampunk.
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Amazon's "Look Inside" function provides an excerpt.
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Publishers Weekly has reservations, but concludes that the book is "still well suited for a bit of early summer beach reading".

Urban fantasy novel, third "Shadows Inquiries" novel following Sins & Shadows (2009) and Ghosts & Echoes (2010), about a private investigator who handles supernatural cases.
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This book concerns five victims of a serial killer who come back to life as shapeshifters.
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Lyn Benedict is a pen name for Lane Robins, whose website has this page about the series but no page yet for this volume.

Urban fantasy novel, first in a new series, about a private eye who discovers that she's an immortal huntress.
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The author's site has this description with an excerpt.
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Amazon also has an excerpt via its "Look Inside" function, and reader reviews.

Military SF novel, first book in a new "Lost Fleet" series following six earlier books, most recently Victorious (2010).
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In this book Admiral Geary leads a new "First Fleet" into alien territory.
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The author is John G. Hemry writing as Jack Campbell. His new website has a description and a link to a Word document excerpt.
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Publishers Weekly says that Campbell "combines the best parts of military SF and grand space opera."
Amazon has mostly positive reader reviews.

Alternate history fantasy novel, first of a series, about an ex-con hired by the Bureau of Investigation for his magical talent.
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Baen's site has this description with links to several chapters.
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Publishers Weekly wasn't impressed, calling it "a run-of-the-mill action yarn that's heavy on fights and violence and light on ideas", but reader reviews on Amazon are enthusiastic, one long review calling it "a perfect novel".

Vampire novel and political thriller, second in a series following the author's first novel Blood Oath (2010), about a 140-year-old vampire who has been personal aide to the US president since the Andrew Jackson era.
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The author's site has descriptions, various extras, links to interviews, etc.
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John Scalzi this week featured the author talking about how he killed Osama bin Laden.
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Amazon has mostly positive reader reviews.

Humorous fantasy novel, eleventh in the popular Southern Vampire series about Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse that began with Dead Until Dark (2001) and included most recently Dead in the Family (2010).
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The author's website has this excerpt.
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Reader reviews on Amazon, over 150, are mixed.

Collection of 10 stories, three as by Robin Hobb and 7 as by Megan Lindholm, both pseudonyms for Margaret Lindholm. The stories were first published from 1989 to 2004.
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The Lindholm stories include Nebula and Sturgeon Award finalist "Silver Lady and the Fortyish Man", Hugo and Nebula finalist "A Touch of Lavender", and Nebula finalist "Cut".
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The publisher's site has this description
The Publishers Weekly review concludes, "Under any name, Margaret Lindholm's assured prose has an unerring ability to tug on the reader's heartstrings."

Fantasy romance novel, second in a series following Trolls in the Hamptons (2010), about a graphic novelist with the ability to bring her fantasy subjects to life.
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The publisher's site has this description.
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The author's site has a short excerpt with a list of forthcoming volumes in the series.

Near-future thriller, second book of a trilogy following Equations of Life (Apr 2011), about a Russian genius living in London who gets involved in a war between mobsters, cops, and tycoons.
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The next book, Degrees of Freedom, is due in June.
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Orbit's site has this post describing the series and presenting the op-art covers of all three books.
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Amazon's "Look Inside" function provides an excerpt.

Young adult fantasy novel about Sunny, a 12-year-old albino Nigerian girl who discovers her magic powers.
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The publisher's site has this description.
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The author's site has a description with quotes from reviews.
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The Publishers Weekly review concludes, "...this tale is filled with marvels and is sure to appeal to teens whose interest in fantasy goes beyond dwarves and fairies."
Gary K. Wolfe reviewed it in the February issue of Locus Magazine: "If Okorafor's earlier novels were characterized by perilous quests through green jungles or postapocalyptic deserts, Akata Witch narrows its focus almost entirely to the town of Aba and its surroundings; the quest lies in what Sunny learns, and what she becomes. The neat part is, young readers engrossed in the suspenseful surface of the narrative likely won't see this coming -- or what the importance of books and learning is to the novel -- until it falls into their laps like chittims at the end of the tale."

Anthology of 14 original science fiction and fantasy stories.
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Authors include Andy Duncan, Michael Swanwick, James Patrick Kelly, Jo Walton, Jeffrey Ford, and Nalo Hopkinson.
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Strahan's site has the complete table of contents.
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Night Shade's site has a description and order page.
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Amazon's "Look Inside" function provides an excerpt.
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Publishers Weekly said the volume "has almost no weak links", citing Rachel Swirsky's story as a highlight; the review concludes, "Strahan continues to raise the bar for original genre anthology series."
Gary K. Wolfe and Rich Horton both review the book in the May issue of Locus Magazine -- Wolfe comments, "Strahan has fairly rapidly ascended to the front rank of SF editors in the past decade, but the Eclipse series is arguably his most personal project, and the one which most clearly reveals his own predilections." -- and Lois Tilton's review for Locus Online is here.

SF novel about an invasion by hybrids of humans and the aliens who abducted them.
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Tor's website has this description and an excerpt.
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Publishers Weekly complains about "Stilted prose, flat characters, cartoonish emotion, and implausible science", but reader reviews on Amazon are generally positive.

Nonfiction, subtitled "An Illustrated Guide to the World of Imaginary Airships, Corsets and Goggles, Mad Scientists, and Strange Literature".
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The book has contributions from Bruce Sterling, Catherynne M. Valente, Rick Klaw, Jess Nevins, and others, and has color illustrations throughout. Includes an index.
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Abrams' site has this description.
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Amazon's "Look Inside" function includes the table of contents and several sample pages.

Epic military fantasy novel, first of a series, set in a world connected by airships where two rival empires vie for an invention that could revolutionize warfare.
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Weis' site has this description, including a note that an RPG is in development in time for GenCon in August, where Weis is lifetime guest of honor.

Fantasy steampunk novel about sky pirates whose latest heist goes wrong.
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Spectra's site has this description with an excerpt.
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First published in 2009 in the UK, it was a finalist for the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 2010.
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This review of the 2010 Clarke Award shortlist by Dan Hartland said that "Wooding's straight-forward adventure yarn stands out for its lack of pretension and modest craft."
The Publishers Weekly review concludes, "Beautifully crafted prose and some remarkably imaginative scenes prop up the sluggish plot, and Wooding's sprawling, multifaceted world and rough-and-tumble action will delight steampunk fans."

This page lists selected newly published science fiction, fantasy, and horror books seen by Locus Online, via purchases, review copies received, or bookstore sightings. (Locus Online does not have access to materials sent to Locus Magazine).

Review copies received will be listed (though reprints and reissues are on other pages), but not galleys or advance reading copies.

* = first edition
+ = first US edition

Date with publisher info is official publication month.

'Nominal Publication Date' is the day of publication, typically as indicated by Amazon.com.

Date in parentheses at paragraph end is date seen or received.

Locus Online is an associate of Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. Your purchase of books through these links (click on titles or covers) helps support Locus Online.